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Age Discrimination at Work

nytimes.com

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Re: Age Discrimination at Work

#11

Post by justanother »

fiblye wrote: post #3

I was applying to a job with a large game studio. The interview was going pretty well, I'd thought. We talked a bit about how we'd implement certain gameplay elements, the content of the projects we've worked on, and overall it just seemed good and we all seemed to get along pretty well. Then they asked me how old I was. Their response to my age was, "Oh... maybe it's a little late then. You're not too old, but... ki…

In the United States, literally nobody should be asking your age during a job interview.

Re: Age Discrimination at Work

#12

Post by robin_reala »

justanother wrote: post #11
fiblye wrote: post #3

I was applying to a job with a large game studio. The interview was going pretty well, I'd thought. We talked a bit about how we'd implement certain gameplay elements, the content of the projects we've worked on, and overall it just seemed good and we all seemed to get along pretty well. Then they asked me how old I was. Their response to my age was, "Oh... maybe it's a little late then. You're not too old, but... ki…

In the United States, literally nobody should be asking your age during a job interview.

In the UK (and I suspect all of the EU?) it’s specifically illegal to discriminate on age (https://www.gov.uk/employer-preventing-discrimination), and when I was last interviewing there HR would remove any birthdates that came in on CVs before passing them over to the interviewers.

Re: Age Discrimination at Work

#13

Post by bachmeier »

factorialboy wrote: post #5

Allow me to provide a contrarian view. I'm not disagreeing that age-discrimination does not exist, however I must say it's not always the case. I'm 35, so I wouldn't qualify as young but neither old. Businesses tend to recruit younger devs for few reasons: - They can be easily convinced to work longer hours - They are typically paid much less However there is one trait in older devs that make them undesirable: - They…

"Businesses tend to recruit younger devs for few reasons:

- They can be easily convinced to work longer hours

- They are typically paid much less"

Older workers and younger workers are paid the same way - they agree on a salary when they start working and that's what they're paid. It's so common on HN to see age discrimination dismissed as not real because of pay. That argument doesn't make any sense. The same goes for working conditions. If you're hiring someone for a position that requires you to work certain hours, that doesn't really have anything to do with the age of the applicant.

And anyway, this article wasn't about software development, which has unique characteristics.

Re: Age Discrimination at Work

#14

Post by rzzzt »

factorialboy wrote: post #5

Allow me to provide a contrarian view. I'm not disagreeing that age-discrimination does not exist, however I must say it's not always the case. I'm 35, so I wouldn't qualify as young but neither old. Businesses tend to recruit younger devs for few reasons: - They can be easily convinced to work longer hours - They are typically paid much less However there is one trait in older devs that make them undesirable: - They…

> The thing about biases are that the mind that nurtures them can easily justify them, thus making the very biases appear rational and logical.

https://scottberkun.com/essays/40-why-smart-people-defend-ba...

Re: Age Discrimination at Work

#15

Post by jasoneckert »

I've seen and heard of age discrimination in non-tech industries, but in the tech industry I believe that age discrimination is often mistaken for skills obsolescence.

As a software developer for as long as I can remember, I'm actually at the top of my game now in my 40s - I can software engineer (plan) off the top of my head, and my tenacity is balanced with a sense of direction I never had as a younger developer. I spend half the time developing and produce 10 times the results (there's still crunch time every so often though).

The trick is to keep your mind active - I have a job that allows me to do a lot of side development projects outside of working hours, and I always take on a new project at least once a year that is out of my comfort zone (if it looks impossible, it's perfect).

Re: Age Discrimination at Work

#16

Post by Kudos »

factorialboy wrote: post #5

Allow me to provide a contrarian view. I'm not disagreeing that age-discrimination does not exist, however I must say it's not always the case. I'm 35, so I wouldn't qualify as young but neither old. Businesses tend to recruit younger devs for few reasons: - They can be easily convinced to work longer hours - They are typically paid much less However there is one trait in older devs that make them undesirable: - They…

> be prepared to compete with the fresh crop of talent coming in

The whole point is that you're not given a fair chance to compete, with your resume being discarded simply because you are older.

Re: Age Discrimination at Work

#17

Post by noir_lord »

factorialboy wrote: post #5

Allow me to provide a contrarian view. I'm not disagreeing that age-discrimination does not exist, however I must say it's not always the case. I'm 35, so I wouldn't qualify as young but neither old. Businesses tend to recruit younger devs for few reasons: - They can be easily convinced to work longer hours - They are typically paid much less However there is one trait in older devs that make them undesirable: - They…

> I would argue that victimhood about agism does not help anybody. If you are in a craft, where the barrier to entry is low, be prepared to compete with the fresh crop of talent coming in.

Not a fair competition if the people hiring are biased by a false notion of "younger === better", when I was young I noticed that the older devs had their shit together in ways I didn't and I made an effort to learn from them (things like thorough documentation, keeping a log of things that broke for next time, writing the code, then rewriting it to it's simplest form, the avoidance of 'clever' code and clarity over clever that kind of thing).

As for biases, yeah it is easy to get jaded and see "Super shiny Foo" as another Bar that you dealt with a decade ago with the same mistakes (and to an extent that can be true) but the world turns.

I've joked for decades that if you want to know what next years hotness will be look at what the academics in the field where doing 20-25 years ago.

After all, experience is learning from your mistakes, wisdom is learning from other peoples.

Re: Age Discrimination at Work

#18

Post by durnygbur »

factorialboy wrote: post #5

Allow me to provide a contrarian view. I'm not disagreeing that age-discrimination does not exist, however I must say it's not always the case. I'm 35, so I wouldn't qualify as young but neither old. Businesses tend to recruit younger devs for few reasons: - They can be easily convinced to work longer hours - They are typically paid much less However there is one trait in older devs that make them undesirable: - They…

> - They tend to carry baggage from the past. This comes in various flavors, such as biases one has regarding the path of their careers, their interpersonal relationships (social and official), technology choices etc.

When one begins the career, one keeps hearing in the interviews "we want more experience". Ok then, 10 years down the road and they say "it's not experience what you've acquired, but bias".

Just whatever it takes to lowball you, playing the nasty "you're not worthy" interview game. The "bias" is the same bollocks as an "inexperience" (from the perspective of the interview negotiations).

Re: Age Discrimination at Work

#19

Post by fiblye »

justanother wrote: post #11
fiblye wrote: post #3

I was applying to a job with a large game studio. The interview was going pretty well, I'd thought. We talked a bit about how we'd implement certain gameplay elements, the content of the projects we've worked on, and overall it just seemed good and we all seemed to get along pretty well. Then they asked me how old I was. Their response to my age was, "Oh... maybe it's a little late then. You're not too old, but... ki…

In the United States, literally nobody should be asking your age during a job interview.

I don't live in the US and age discrimination here certainly isn't uncommon. I didn't expect it to be so obvious, though.

Re: Age Discrimination at Work

#20

Post by Tade0 »

noir_lord wrote: post #9
michalu wrote: post #6

> At 66, I am in excellent health.... Then presume I’m Miranda Priestly... I do not want a childproof cap on anything that threatens to ruin my expensive manicure ... I do NOT have any children or grandchildren! If you're 66 and you're still sitting around in a corporate job, and you have no children because you model yourself after a BS character from a BS movie then you're really just taking up space for someone wh…

> you're really just taking up space for someone who needs to feed their kids, has a potential to grow, and a better place to funnel the earned money than "expensive manicure" That's a ridiculous assertion, if someone is physically well and wants to work it's nobody's business how they spent then spend the money they earn. Choosing to have kids or not shouldn't give you any special status in the workforce at all (tho…

Choosing to have kids or not shouldn't give you any special status in the workforce at all (though in reality it often does).

Unless economic growth depends on birthrate - which it does.

No incentives to have children -> less children -> less future taxpayers

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